In Tennessee, one out of every twenty property tax decisions (and maybe more) address the question of whether a taxpayer has taken the necessary steps to appeal the assessor's valuation. It's a canned opinion that administrative law judges use that addresses the statutory appeal procedures and whether the taxpayer has established a "reasonable cause" for why they failed to timely appeal the assessment. In an overwhelming majority of these decisions, the administrative judges conclude that the taxpayer has failed to establish a reasonable cause. Ignorance of the law is no defense...
That is what makes a recent decision somewhat remarkable. The taxpayer not only failed to timely appeal to the county board but also failed to timely appeal to the state board. The ALJ concluded that there was reasonable cause in both instances. Reasonable cause for the late filed county appeal was based on communications from the assessor's office that she would be contacted a later date because of the significant number of appeals. On the deadline for the appeal to the state board, the taxpayer was out of town. You're thinking, no way, but you would be wrong. That was reasonable cause too, and the appeal went forward and the taxpayer received partial relief on a valuation issue involving whether her property had lake access.
All in all, this is a case to have handy in the event that you are trying to deal with missed property tax appeal deadlines in Tennessee.
The decision can be found at this link ... http://www.comptroller1.state.tn.us/repository/SB/judgecollier/2012.02.14-EvansMargaretLarson.pdf
Follow on Twitter: @TNTaxLawyer
No comments:
Post a Comment